Alliance Bakery & Cafe: User Reviews

Excellent
By epcheerio from Wicker Park, August 20, 2009

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I visited this bakery while in town on vacation. The Pastries were amazing, and the staff and coffee was great! Many people complain about the prices, but many also can't appreciate the work, and cost of some of the ingridients used. Many quality, or high end shops not only charge for the ingriedients used, but also the time and detail put into this work. This is not Wal-mart deli bakery, if you want cheap cookies, go to target... if you want to try something new and creative i would highly recommened this bakery.

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I so badly wanted to like this place
By Joe1701D from Bucktown, April 20, 2009

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I live in the area and have frequented Alliance on numerous occasions (take that, 'Bucks!). In all fairness, the cupcakes are excellent, but the other pastry offerings (and the sandwiches) are pretty blah.

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Deliciously Disappointing
By jojo from wicker park, May 24, 2008

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We live in the Wicker Park neighborhood and are long time patrons of the Alliance Bakery, but we recently had a bad experience with those amazing looking cakes in the window. Neither my partner nor I had ever ordered a cake designed with fondant. Since I was completing graduate school, we decided to order something special for family that would be in town for the celebration. There was an awesome cake in the window that looked like a giant cheeseburger. Inspired, we decided to get one that looked like a deep-dish pizza. When I ordered the cake, it was much more expensive than originally quoted…over $160 for a cake that fed eight. When I picked the cake up, it was the size and dimensions of a regular cake, NOT of a deep-dish pizza, the frosting was pink instead of red like a marinara, with just a few fondant pepperonis and (gray) mushrooms. My expectations had been set by their impressive display window, and even the Alliance baker who heard my complaint agreed that he would also have been disappointed. The only offer made at that point was to add a few more pepperonis and mushrooms. Not only was my entire party very disappointed in the cake’s appearance, the amount of money we spent was far beyond our budget, which made the disappointing product smart all the more. The cake itself was delicious, but the experience was a bad one that left us sad. We wanted to be happy, satisfied customers. We wanted a realistic looking cake like the ones their window display advertises. The Alliance neither delivered nor offered any recompense. We expected much more from them.

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Tastiest and Friendliest Bakery in City
By Lee from River West, May 10, 2008

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We ordered a 3-D Thomas the Train cake for our son's first birthday. The cake was the spitting image of Thomas and the cake was moist and tasty too. The service was attentive and professional (the owner Peter dealt with us). I spoke with at least 5 bakeries in the Chicago area that do these kinds of specialty custom cakes and went with Alliance because the service was great (I encountered some less than friendly bakers during my quest) and the price reasonable. When we went to pick up the cake, we were definitely not disappointed. Alliance is the place to go for one-of-a-kind cakes that taste great and friendly professional service.

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Delicious cupcakes and spritz cookies....
By Jackie from Chicago, IL, October 27, 2006

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Delicious cupcakes and spritz cookies. Serves Intelligentsia Coffee which is part of the Fair Trade program. Very friendly staff.

Worst cookies ever! I was...
By malrus from Chicago, IL, August 10, 2006

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Worst cookies ever! I was horribly disappointed to have bought a dozen chocolate chip cookies from here and then try them and they tasted like bad play dough. And they were dry and crumbly (I think they'd been there for a while.) Has anyone who sells these ever tried them? Peanut butter cookies were the same. The lemon shortbread were pretty good, but they also said it was because they were made today. While the cakes looked very neat, I won't be going back ever to try one after those cookies.

When you need (real) Paczkis,...
By Stanley from Chicago, IL, February 28, 2006

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When you need (real) Paczkis, look no further. This is where you get them, they are good enough to get your Polish grandmothers approval...

The sweets were decent, but...
By Nick L. from Chicago, IL, October 9, 2005

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The sweets were decent, but the people were rude and the dining area was drab. There are too many good places in Wicker Park to go here.